Re: turning on minor modes from hooks

[Tassilo Horn <tassilo@member.fsf.org>]

Daniel Colascione <danc@merrillprint.com> writes:

Hi!

>> A call with no arguments, as in (auto-save-mode), naturally ought to
>> toggle the mode or turn it on.  But (auto-save-mode nil) has the
>> natural meaning of turning the mode off.
>> 
>> Perhaps we could make minor mode functions take &rest arguments so
>> they can distinguish those two cases.  However, that could be a
>> painful change,
>
> What about some kind of enable-minor-mode function?

That's what a some minor modes already do, for example
`turn-on-eldoc-mode', `turn-on-follow-mode', or
`turn-on-gnus-dired-mode'.  For some of them there's also a turn-off
command.

Maybe that's a good convention.  If so, then probably things like
`define-minor-mode' should generate those functions automatically.

BTW, for me the toggling has never been a problem.  When I customize
some mode by putting stuff in its hook, I always define some
`th-foo-mode-init' function where I put stuff into.  And then it makes
no difference in wether I write (some-minor-mode) or (some-minor-mode 1)
there.  But I agree that it's a problem when customizing with the
`customize' interface...

Bye,
Tassilo